The J-channel siding tool significantly increases the ease of creating drainage tabs, notches, and miter cuts during the installation of J-channel siding, proximate to doors and windows of a building.
In the past, an individual, during finishing activities of siding installation, was required to use a duckbill or aviation-type of snip to cut tabs and/or notches into J-channel siding for finishing areas adjacent to doors and windows. Placement of J-channel siding proximate to the corners of doors and windows was especially problematic in that the use of an aviation snip for creation of tabs and/or notches for mating or interlocking of the J-channel siding pieces proximate to a corner was extremely difficult and time consuming. In order to create a tab or notch for mating of perpendicular pieces of J-channel siding, an individual in the past was required to make at least two or three separate and distinct cuts within the confined space of a J-channel. An individual was frequently required to use his or her best efforts to position the cuts in a desired location while simultaneously attempting to make the separate cuts the same length for creation of a rectangular shaped tab or notch. The individual's efforts in making the distinct and separate cuts, of uniform length, in a desired location within the confined space of a J-channel, was extremely challenging and time consuming. As such, significant time loss to workmen occurred in conjunction with the associated material waste due to inaccurate and/or unusable cuts.
An attempt to solve this problem is disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 5,483,746 to Byers, which created a siding cutting tool which made narrow slits in siding at a location as desired by an individual. This patent failed to solve the initial problem of eliminating the necessity for an individual to make multiple cuts for creation of tabs and/or notches within adjacent pieces of J-channel siding. In addition, the '746 patent failed to solve the problem of making cuts within the J-channel of uniform size. Further, the '746 patent failed to provide a tool which maximized the flexibility to a user, enabling an individual to selectively make a tab or notch through the one-step or cut operation of the tool. As such, the '746 patent may have represented a perceived improvement over the duckbill or aviation-type of snip, without solving the efficiency and related problems associated with finishing and installation of mating adjacent perpendicular pieces of siding proximate to the doors and windows of a building.
A J-channel siding tool is needed to minimize installation time and maximize efficiency of a worker for installing and mating adjacent pieces of perpendicular J-channel siding proximate to the doors and/or windows of a building. The J-channel siding tool enables a worker to place, in a one-cut operation, a drainage/mating tab, notch, or miter finish cut within J-channel siding.